Fearful Symmetry: A Study of William BlakeThis brilliant outline of Blake's thought and commentary on his poetry comes on the crest of the current interest in Blake, and carries us further towards an understanding of his work than any previous study. Here is a dear and complete solution to the riddles of the longer poems, the so-called "Prophecies," and a demonstration of Blake's insight that will amaze the modern reader. The first section of the book shows how Blake arrived at a theory of knowledge that was also, for him, a theory of religion, of human life and of art, and how this rigorously defined system of ideas found expression in the complicated but consistent symbolism of his poetry. The second and third parts, after indicating the relation of Blake to English literature and the intellectual atmosphere of his own time, explain the meaning of Blake's poems and the significance of their characters. |
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... body of his work. Consequently the mere familiarity of some of the lyrics is no guarantee that they will not be wrongly associated with their author. If they indicate that we must take Blake seriously as a conscious and deliberate ...
... body.” “Body” in Blake means the whole man as an object of perception. We need another word to describe the man as a perceiver, and that word must also describe the whole man. “Soul” is possible, though it has theological overtones ...
A Study of William Blake Northrop Frye. Man has no Body distinct from his Soul; for that call'd Body is a portion of Soul discern'd by the five Senses.85 At the time that he wrote the aphorisms referred to above he used the rather ...
... body” by a euphemism. Thought being largely reflection, it is an “inward” activity: those who specialize in “outward” activity are not thinkers, but the practical people who do things. Scientists should be trained to see the sun as a ...
... Body; and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy.“ Blake's poem Visions of the Daughters of Albion ends in an apotheosis of desire; ]erusalem in one of intellect. Those who have succeeded in mentally separating the ...